More from Thomas Merton
When your tongue is silent, you can rest in the silence of the forest. When your imagination is silent, the forest speaks to you. It tells you of its unreality and of the Reality of God. But when your mind is silent, then the forest suddenly becomes magnificently real and blazes transparently with the Reality of God.
Thomas MertonThomas Merton What can we gain by sailing to the moon if we cannot cross the abyss that separates us from ourselves?
Thomas MertonThomas Merton Every one of us is shadowed by an illusory person: a false Self. We are not very good at recognizing illusions, least of all the ones we cherish about ourselves.
Thomas MertonThomas Merton May God prevent us from becoming “right-thinking men”-that is to say men who agree perfectly with their own police.
Thomas MertonThomas Merton When you see God in everyone, then they see God in you.
Thomas MertonThomas Merton The beginning of love is the will to let those we love be perfectly themselves.
Thomas MertonThomas Merton If you yourself are at peace, then there is at least some peace in the world.
Thomas MertonThomas Merton The greatest need of our time is to clean out the enormous mass of mental and emotional rubbish that clutters our minds.
Thomas MertonThomas Merton Love is not a matter of getting what you want. Quite the contrary. The insistence on always having what you want, on always being satisfied, on always being fulfilled, makes love impossible.
Thomas MertonThomas Merton Ours is a time of anxiety because we have willed it to be so. Our anxiety is not imposed on us by force from outside. We impose it on our world and upon one another from within ourselves.
Thomas MertonThomas Merton A life is either all spiritual or not spiritual at all. No man can serve two masters. Your life is shaped by the end you live for. You are made in the image of what you desire.
Thomas MertonThomas Merton We live on the brink of disaster because we do not know how to let life alone. We do not respect the living and fruitful contradictions and paradoxes of which true life is full.
Thomas MertonThomas Merton Fear narrows the little entrance of our heart. It shrinks up our capacity to love. It freezes up our power to give ourselves.
Thomas MertonThomas Merton The man who sweats under his mask, whose role makes him itch with discomfort, who hates the division in himself, is already beginning to be free.
Thomas MertonThomas Merton Pride makes us artificial and humility makes us real.
Thomas MertonThomas Merton We are so obsessed with doing that we have no time and no imagination left for being. As a result, men are valued not for what they are but for what they do or what they have – for their usefulness.
Thomas MertonThomas Merton
Original quotes
From our community writers
Someone rejected you does not mean you are not worthy. Maybe they can’t afford to be with you.
Jacklyn TysonJacklyn Tyson I will love you from afar it’s better this way because close up it hurts too much.
Melissa AndersonMelissa Anderson Maybe if you hold me tight, our love won’t be as shallow.
Mira R. AridiMira R. Aridi Sometimes a person is in peace & in the piece at the same time.
Jessica CollinsJessica Collins Between day and night there was a moment of silence.
Frode GaslandFrode Gasland But doesn’t it hurt to feel so much and pretend not to?
Brad NeatonBrad Neaton Admire your sweet way of glowing; your passionate way of flowing.
Ana SoulfulAna Soulful Darling, you are a warrior, for even though each day feels like a battle, you keep fighting and live on.
Sarah ShawkatSarah Shawkat
Meet the writers
More on journey
I walked a mile with Pleasure; She chattered all the way. But left me none the wiser For all she had to say. I walked a mile with Sorrow And ne’er a word said she; But oh, the things I learned from her When Sorrow walked with me!
Robert BrowningRobert Browning They spoke less and less between them until at last they were silent altogether as is often the way with travelers approaching the end of a journey.
Cormac McCarthyCormac McCarthy We think we are the victims of time. In reality, the way of the world isn’t fixed anywhere. How could that be possible? We are our own journey. And therefore we are time as well. We are the same. Fugitive. Inscrutable. Ruthless.
Cormac McCarthyCormac McCarthy The devil can only destroy those who are already on their way to damnation.
Geoffrey ChaucerGeoffrey Chaucer Bitterness leads nowhere. It turns back on itself. It is the eternal cul-de-sac.
Agatha ChristieAgatha Christie I am very opinionated and sometimes a very irritating character but, I have learnt that the quest to learn is a journey, not a destination.
Rakesh JhunjhunwalaRakesh Jhunjhunwala Life is a journey, but don’t worry, you’ll find a parking spot at the end.
Isaac AsimovIsaac Asimov Propaganda is not an end in itself, but a means to an end. If the means achieves the end then the means is good. The new Ministry has no other aim than to unite the nation behind the ideal of the national revolution.
Joseph GoebbelsJoseph Goebbels
